zuccotti park

The head of a column of protesters leaving Zuccotti Park and heading to the New York City Town Hall. The protesters were flanked by police officers. The protesters were chanting slogans like “We are the 99%” and “A people united will never be divided.” Photo by Diego Lynch

Zuccotti Park, in the heart of New York’s financial district, was a tumult with musical performers, performance art, die-ins and the rhythmic chanting of slogans yesterday. These congregants supplanted the usual foot traffic of professionals to rally for more affordable housing as part of the 4th Anniversary of Occupy Wall Street’s occupation of the park.

“I have a 22-year-old daughter who just finished college, who can’t get a job.” said Wensum Pendergrass, 56, of Flatbush, Brooklyn, and a hospital employee. He said his own rent has gone up.

Wensum Pendergrass, a hospital worker, driven to rally in Zuccotti Park by her desire for less expensive rent. She is a mother and her daughter lives with her. She is certain that if she loses her job she will become homeless. Photo by Diego Lynch

Pendergrass’ experience is in line with city trends. According to a 2015 Pew Research Poll, only 67% of people aged 18-34 live independently and, according to Streeteasy, the typical new renter will spend 60% of their income on their rent.

“A studio is $900, come on. A one bedroom is $1500, a two bedroom is $3000, I am not talking about Manhattan, I am talking about right down there in Brooklyn,” said Pendergrass. “We the people in Brooklyn, the working class people, who are working in all the nursing homes, who are working in the hospitals, who are working in the restaurants, we can not make it.”

But the impact of high housing prices on their lives wasn’t the only thing drawing people to the park.

Chuck Helms, a member of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. He was covered in pro-union ephemera, including the flag, buttons, and embroidery on his clothing. He had been attending Occupy Wall Street since September of 2011, and now comes to Zuccotti Park every Friday. Photo by Diego Lynch

“I am a member of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers,” said Chuck Helms, 68 who protests at the park every Friday. “I come here from New Jersey and I know the importance of this to the children of America, the importance of the occupy movement. “My father’s generation handed down unionism to my generation, on a silver platter, we stole the platter, and we never taught our children that need for unionism.”

Zuccotti Park was the epicenter for Occupy Wall Street, a protest movement which sprung from the outrage associated with the Financial Crisis.

Occupy Wall Street’s influence was apparent in the park on the movement’s 4th anniversary. The chants that flowed over the park, “We are the 99%, and so are you,” and “The people united, will never be divided,” were mainstays of the Occupy Wall Street movement.

The reasons for being there were not constrained to changing government policy.

“Everybody should go to protests,” said Josh Hollingshed, 24, a philosophy student at The New School. “They are an important part of self development, of affirming beliefs.”

But he was careful to explain that attending was a political act.

“There is a better meaning for the term politics than electoral politics,” said Hollingshed. “People put a lot of energy into who is going to be president, when they would be a lot better putting that energy into their communities.”

But all of the protests, and the subsequent march to City Hall, were interspersed with shouted demands for lower rent.

“For the homeless people, I think the government can find a way to make the shelters more accessible, “ said Pendergrass. “If you don’t get to shelters by a certain time they have to sleep outside. “If I lose my job I will be homeless.”

But at just 6:30 AM, the birthplace of the Occupy Movement had more police than protesters and Steyert’s call was met with little response. Still, Steyert was excited.

“It feels like a birthday,” he said. “September 17 will always be a day in history. I’m here to show that the movement still has fire in it.”

Steyert, a Queens native and Vietnam veteran, said he was apart of every major movement of OWS, from the Brooklyn Bridge incident— which ended with 700 arrests— to May Day and finally, today, his “Occu-versary”. Steyert was wearing a “Veterans for Peace” shirt, a “Vietnam Vet” hat, and waving a dirty, yellow Gadsen flag that read “Don’t Tread On Me”. The senior citizen called it his battle flag.

“I added these words in permanent marker,” he explained, proudly holding out the flag. “So now it says ‘The 99% says Don’t Tread On Me’. This is a message for all Americans.”

But by 7:09 AM, Steyert’s battle flag lay abandoned in the middle of Broadway. The 69-year-old veteran had been arrested for blocking traffic. Steyert continued to chant “Occupy Wall Street!” as he was led away. His arrest was the first of more than 100 OWS arrests.

Six minutes later around 200 people had gathered near Zuccotti Park. The diverse crowd was abuzz with energy. The vibe was celebratory. Bands played as confetti was released in the air and protesters in elaborate costumes marched with props. But the older members of OWS were focused on the mission, not the frills.

Most brought up the rear end of the crowd. Others could be spotted in the rowdy mass here and there, walking in groups of two or three with their Army green “Veterans for Peace” shirts.

Last year, a profile of OWS said the average Occupier was 33. But the baby boomers of the movement, those 60+, are present and are making a statement.

“This is the worst I’ve seen the country in my entire life,” said Bob Nash, 69, of Long Island and a disabled Marine veteran. “Thirty percent of the homeless in the United States are veterans, that’s a disgrace.”

Steyert said he is a seasoned protester. After leaving the Navy, he began protesting the Vietnam War in 1968. He said OWS is reminiscent of the Anti-War movement.

“I never thought since the Vietnam War that I’d see that kind of enthusiasm and citizen action again,” said Steyert, “We’re all pissed and it’s a beautiful day to get arrested.”

After being booted out of Zuccotti Park last weekend, after a six month occupation, Occupy Wall Street protestors have moved to a public space – Union Square Park – leaving the community with mixed reactions.

In the early morning hours of November 15th, New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg changed the face of Occupy Wall Street forever. Teams of police officers flooded the park, pulling protestors out of tents, sending them scrambling into the black of night, leaving in their wake the remnants of their 33,000-square-foot piece of paradise.

Before that moment Zuccotti was amorphous, a thermometer of the ever-changing scope of the Occupy Wall Street movement. In the early days, when the nights were warm and the company few, Zucotti resembled a mountain valley—a couple hundred protestors – heads resting against the cool, slick granite – dotting the otherwise open space like columbines, enveloped by the towering peaks of the financial district.

But as the movement grew, the park evolved. In true homage to Manhattan, space became a sought after commodity. Mattresses, airbeds and possessions wrapped in blue tarps turned Zuccotti into an ocean of inaccessibility; a stroll in the park was no longer an option. Tents sprang up in erector-set fashion—the domed domiciles, each decorated with the flair of their respective occupiers, made Zuccotti look more refugee camp than urban picnic spot.

One look at the park now and there’s no sniff of a revolution. When the sanitation plows rolled in after the raid of Zuccotti Park, they pushed out a nearly two-month accumulation of personal items: tents and tarps, homemade signs and mattresses, but most importantly, the occupiers. A Friday night at Zuccotti no longer hears the methodical beat of drums, or homegrown acoustic melodies set to lyrics of protestation.

Now the ground is clean, almost too clean for the outdoors; the sheen of granite reflects the sparkle of honey locusts draped in white lights; and the steps, once battered with the words, “All day, all week,” now only hear the laughter of a playful child.

Protestors held a rally with students from all over the city in Union Square today and marched along Fifth Avenue. Photo by Nicole Guzzardi

Groups of NYPD officers stood armed at every corner inside the Union Square subway station this evening watching Occupy Wall Street protestors as they chanted and expressed opinions to anyone willing to listen. while outside in the square, students from all over the city joined protestors to rally against the 1 percent.

Protestors gathered inside the Union Square station to try to engage commuters in conversation by sharing personal stories, hoping to highlight problems faced by the 99 percent.

“It’s to talk to people about what’s going on,” said Joe Chavez, 28, a protestor from East Williamsburg, Brooklyn. “It’s not to shut the subways down, its not about taking them over. It’s about sharing our stories.”

The Occupied Wall Street Journal is the Occupy Wall Street Movement's personal newspaper, disseminating news about protests and the change they wish to see. Photo by Nicole Guzzardi

Michael Levitin, 35, from San Francisco, Calif. is one of the five editors of the paper. He was handing out free papers for commuters to read on the subway, further spreading the occupiers’ message. Levitan said the paper is funded by the more than 1,600 donors from around the world. The paper’s fifth issue, which will be a national one, will be launched next week.

Meanwhile, above ground, protestors and students from schools all over the city gathered at Union Square to hold a student rally and march along Fifth Avenue.

Ally Freeman, a student from the New School, attended the OWS student rally today in Union Square. She took out student loans for her education and worries about student debt affecting people her age. Photo by Nicole Guzzardi

Ally Freeman, 18, from Greenpoint, Brooklyn, a literary studies major at The New School, said students are especially affected. She takes out student loans to pay high tuition prices, and said it’s time for young people to speak up.

“It’s really important that we be here, to show just because they’ve moved us out of Zuccotti Park doesn’t mean there isn’t still this movement,” Freeman said. “We’re still here and we’re still fighting.”

As for the threat of losing their home base of Zuccotti Park, some protestors said they aren’t worried.

Tielor McBride, 25, a protestor from Kansas City, said you can take an idea out of anywhere and the lack of space won’t slow down the movement.

“It was never about the park, it exists in the minds and the hearts of the people that believe in it,” he said.

The post eviction era of Occupy Wall Street kicked off with a march from Tribeca’s Juan Pablo Duarte Square back home to reclaim Zuccotti Park.

The march went largely unsupervised by the NYPD, culminating in the protestors spilling off the sidewalks and onto Broadway at Walker Street, holding up southbound traffic as they chanted and slowly stepped their way toward their former home.

When the crowd of several hundred reached Broadway and Chambers Street, they came to a standstill, dancing in circles, tapping their feet to the rhythm of drum beats and chants of, “Get up, get down, there’s a revolution in town.”

One man, clad in shirt and tie, called out from a second story window, pleading for the protestors to stop. But the clump of boisterous protestors stayed until NYPD officers, like cowboys on horseback, came streaking down Murray Street, blocking off Broadway and cutting off protestors, pushing them back onto the sidewalk.

No clashes with police ensued. The group reached Zuccotti Park where they stood shoulder-to-shoulder, smashed and clumped together.

The protestors were allowed back in the park in the evening, but are no longer allowed to camp there.

After the Occupy Wall Street movement suffered a massive blow early Tuesday when police raided Zuccotti Park, protesters joyously reentered the park after spending the day displaced from the park they now call home.

Around 5:30 p.m. today, police slowly started to let protesters back into the park. Passing through a line of security officers and cops, protesters immediately started to chant, “Whose park? Our park!”

“When everyone started to get let back in, there was a feeling of jubilation,” said Leah Meyerhoff, 31 of Brooklyn. “People seemed to be excited to be let back into what some people are calling their home.”

Amidst the celebrations, protesters were still upset about the force with which they were removed. Ramona Duminicioiu, a 28-year-old Romanian visiting the United States to learn about the Occupy Wall Street Movement, was disappointed at the treatment of the protesters.

“The police should not have been here,” she said. “I am very, very outraged. I mean, getting back in the part is not a happiness; it should’ve been normal for the people to be here continuously without being bothered by the local authorities.”

A Supreme Court judge upheld an earlier ruling that protesters cannot camp in the park, but can protest there. But many of the protesters are unsure about the new rules.

“It’s not even exactly clear what the decision is to the laywers,” said Joe Diamond, a member of the Occupy Wall Street media team who just spoke with the movement’s legal team.

Diamond said the lawyers told him that they need time to review the dense court decision, but that the park would in fact be open 24 hours. Tents are not allowed, but the rest remains unknown.

“You ask ten people, you get ten different answers,” Diamond said.

Regardless of the outcome of the hearing, enthusiasm is not dying. Dennis Iturrarde, 46 of Manhattan, said he would like to thank Mayor Bloomberg for the eviction because it spread the word about Occupy Wall Street.

“We cannot sleep, but this is our park,” he said. “I’ll be back here in the morning, every day.”

Lopi LaRoe, who was doing a LiveStream broadcast to supporters around the world said they are being spontaneous.

“We’re improvising life,” LaRoe said “We’re improvising occupation. We’re figuring it out as we go along.”

Zuccotti Park was barricaded off by police today, as protestors who were evicted last night gathered around the perimeter. Photo by Chris Palmer

Today was the most turbulent day of Occupy Wall Street’s two month existence, with protestors being forced out of the park overnight by police and then engaging in marches, standoffs and non-violent confrontations with police throughout the day.

But amidst the commotion, protestors were eager to express that police crackdowns and attempted evictions will only strengthen the movement as a whole.

“I think it’s like cutting of the head of a hydra,” said Robin Mahonen, 56, from Wheeling, W. Va., referring to the mythical Greek beast. “You cut off one head, but nine more grow back.”

Kristina Acevedo said that despite police action against Occupy Wall Street, the movement will not stop. Photo by Chris Palmer

“You think this is going to stop us?” said Kristina Acevedo, 28, from Jersey City, N.J.

Holding a sign that read “Occupy Everything,” Acevedo circled the barricaded park while whistling at police officers and cheering for fellow protestors chanting against the cops.

“This is going to make (the police) feel better for now,” she said. “But this is still where I occupy.”

While this was the first major police movement against New York’s Occupy site, occupation movements across the country have been under siege in recent weeks.

In Oakland, police raided the Occupy encampment Monday for the second time since late October. The first standoff included tear gas and broken windows. The second was apparently much less violent.

Occupy Portland was shut down over the weekend by police, and protestors have denounced the mayor for authorizing the use of excessive force against occupiers.

Seventeen people were arrested over the weekend at Occupy Denver, and in Philadelphia, Mayor Michael Nutter cited “dramatically deteriorating conditions” while expressing his growing frustration with the protest movement residing outside City Hall.

All of this preceded New York’s surprise raid last night, when police barricaded off the blocks surrounding Zuccotti Park, removing protestors and their tents and tarps.

Timothy Gordon said that the police threw away his tent during the raid on Zuccotti Park last night. Photo by Chris Palmer

Timothy Gordon, 20, was at home in Gardner, N.Y., last night, but he said the police took his tent. His friends staying at the campsite told him that the cops were “ruthless.”

“I asked (the police) where my belongings are,” Gordon said. “He said they’re at the dump in Staten Island.”

Chuck Helms, 64, said he would be outraged if police threw out people’s property.

“If they junked them, that’s wrong,” he said emphatically.

“Some people, this was their home, their actual home,” said Acevedo.

“The police are unjust,” Gordon said, wondering aloud how police cars could be emblazoned with the slogan “Courtesy, Professionalism, Respect” while taking his belongings away.

Every time he has left the park, he said, cops have taken his property. So he vowed that he is “never going to part with this (park) again.”

That sense of dedication to the movement was apparent in almost every protestor surrounding the park.

“Every time something like this happens, it gets people outraged,” said Nelson Falu, 36, of Fordham Road, in the Bronx.

He looked over at the park, for the first time in two months filled by nothing other than security guards.

“This was ridiculous,” he said.

“They’re going to make it stronger, I know it,” said Gordon, when asked what the police action will do to the movement.

“If anything, (police action) will invigorate us,” Mahonen echoed.

And despite the blockades and obstacles that stood between protestors and the park they’ve occupied since September, Gordon said once he was allowed back in, his stance would not waver.

NYPD occupied Zuccotti Park this morning, refusing to allow protestors to re-enter after they were evicted by police last night. Photo by Chris Palmer

Shortly after midnight, about 1,000 New York City Police Department officers in riot gear cleared Zuccotti Park of the Occupy Wall Street protesters who have called the downtown park home for the past two months.

The park was completely emptied of protesters, tents, sleeping bags, books and other belongings, by the New York City Police Department, the Fire Department and Sanitation Department, within a few hours.

“Protestors have had two months to occupy the park with tents and sleeping bags. Now they will have to occupy the space with the power of their arguments,” Mayor Bloomberg stated in a press release.

Bloomberg cites dangers to public health, safety and accessibility for the clearance.

“The dangers posed were evident last week,” he stated in the press release. “When an EMT was injured as protestors attempted to prevent him and several police officers from helping a mentally ill man who was menacing others. As an increasing number of large tents and other structures have been erected, these dangers have increased.”

Occupy Wall Street demonstrators tied themselves to structures in the park to evade eviction, according to several protesters who were present when the removal process started around 1 a.m.

Kimberly Howard, 25, from Queens, confirms there were about 1,000 police officers present, some of which worked to remove protesters from the park.

“One female was in the position where she was sitting on the floor,”Howard said. “They lifted her up by all fours and went back. There were people chained to the kitchen. I’m hearing a lot of [accounts] of pepper spray, beatings, some people got arrested. These were the people there for it.”

Howard said trucks and police vans showed up after she left an OWS Spokes Council meeting.

“I witnessed Emergency Service Police come in with two officers standing in the streets [directing] multiple Emergency Service Unit Trucks,” she said. “They were moving them very fast. You could hear the engines, stop and speed up again. So, with that I knew something was coming up.”
There are various accounts of individuals being pepper sprayed after groups of protesters tried to get back to the park after police officials secured a circumference of two blocks around the block with barricades.

“I was pepper sprayed,” said Nicole Carty, 23, who had traveled from Brooklyn at 1 a.m. after getting Emergency Response text messages from OWS group members. “At least 30 people were pepper sprayed. There was a lot of police brutality all throughout last night.”

Several individuals who were pepper sprayed were led by others to open cafes around 2 a.m. where they were able to douse their eyes with a solution of milk and water.

Carty was one of the many people who received text messages from those in Zuccotti Park about the surprise clearance. She said groups of people walked the hours trying to figure out a way to get back to the park. NYPD officers forbid her from going towards the park, forcing her to walk north.

Before walking further away from the park, having arrived on the scene in a taxi cab, Carty recalls seeing the protesters who chained themselves to structures.

“I saw at least 40 people were locking down the park,” Carty said. “They eventually had to be cut out of those locks. Others kicked out of the park probably 100, 200 at least. They were told to go somewhere else. That was what I witnessed.”

People were trying to get through barricades set up on Broadway. Adding to the 200 people already on the scene, individuals were arriving by train and cabs, according to several witnesses who congregated in Foley Square and all around Lower Manhattan this morning to figure out the group’s next steps.

“They are pushing us against it,” Carty said. “They had these plastic buckets, they have helmets. They are literally squeezing people, crushing them against the wall. And people were trying to not be crushed against the walls. I saw a lot of brutality.”

This morning, Carty and Ethan Buckner, 20, from Minneapolis, Minn, and a small group of OWS supporters were making their way from Foley Square towards a large congregation in a park next to Sixth Avenue and Canal Street at approximately 9:30 a.m. Hundreds of protesters filled the square next to roads leading to the Holland Tunnel. More than a dozen police vans met the protesters as they settled.

Buckner witnessed people trying to “soft block” intersections around Zuccotti Park, but the group had trouble with the number of police officers “easily over 1,000” outnumbering those that were there.

“We realized they started bringing trucks of our tents out of the barricades,” Buckner said. “We decided to lock down the intersection. They threw away everything, books, tents, computers,everything.”

Several witnesses at the scene state it was mayhem as people were trying to figure our what to do. Many of the OWS demonstrators kicked out of Zuccotti Park found themselves at Foley Square, a few blocks north of City Hall.

Natas Rivera, 25, from Allentown, Pa., was at Foley Square after traveling throughout the night to make it in time to “protect” the movement.

“I watched it live,” Rivera said. “I saw cops taking people’s tents and throwing them into the street. They were literally throwing everything out over the fence. They started throwing stuff. I was ready to get arrested. I fight for what’s right.”

Rivera says the entire circumference of Foley Square was filled with people before the majority of protesters left the square for a victory march, learning this morning that there was a “Temporary Restraining Order” in favor of the protesters.

A lawyer on site at Foley Square would not speak on the record, but confirmed that OWS received word that there is a hearing scheduled for 11:30 a.m. called upon by Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Lucy Billings regarding the demonstrators rights to set up camp at Zuccotti Park.
Meanwhile, OWS is moving forward with plans to “liberate space and build a movement” with an ongoing demonstration at Sixth Avenue and Canal Street.